One of the great neglected plays of the 20th century has been rescued from near oblivion. It makes an absolutely devastating impact in a production by Richard Jones of stylised strangeness. The translator David Harrower has substituted the more suitable word “Soul” for “Woman” in the title of Bertolt Brecht’s tragi-comic parable, presumably to draw attention to his version’s arresting novelty.

Based on Brecht’s rewritten, almost unknown Santa Monica edition, which heightens the original drama by transforming its main character into a heroin rather than tobacco dealer, The Good Soul of Szechuan might have been written just yesterday. The Chinese location, expressionistically evoked by designer Miriam Buether as a workplace packed with bags of cement or sand and peopled with somnambulistic, drudge-like workers in masks, could be anywhere, though there is a distinct eastern look to most of the actors. Brecht depicts a world sunk in the depths of poverty and alienation. The Water Seller in Adam Gillen’s rending performance gives chorus-like voice to a pervasive despair.

Down from heaven on a visit, three senior gods who are satirically got up by Jones to resemble ineffectual do-gooders, discover the only person who will offer them a room for the night is Jane Horrocks’s generous-spirited prostitute, Shen Te.

In Brecht’s ingenious, ironic plotting, the Gods who reward Shen Te with enough money to buy a tobacconist’s shop are the cause of her undoing, her survival and realisation of how the world works. Greedily exploited in her shop by invasive squatters, she creates a transvestite alter-ego for herself, a tough-guy cousin, Shui Ta, who evicts the unwelcome guests and launches her as a business woman. The play is fuelled by the brilliant perception that everyone requires such a dual or split personality to survive. But when Shen Te falls hopelessly in love with an impecunious and exploitative pilot, crudely impersonated by John Marquez, the conflict between her two selves leads to disaster. Miss Horrocks, endearing but too subdued, fails to distinguish sufficiently between the passionate girl and the black-garbed businessman. But the production is bolstered by David Sawer’s pungent Kurt Weill-like musical interludes and Brecht’s dark, dazzling world-view.

Until 21 June (020 7922 2922, www.youngvic.org).